Yammoune is a lake , nature reserve , village and municipality situated 27 kilometres (17 mi) northwest of Baalbek in Baalbek District , Baalbek-Hermel Governorate , Lebanon . The village has a few hundred inhabitants.
100-629: There are the ruins of a Roman temple (possibly with phoenician-greek origins) in the village that are included in a grouping of Roman Temples of the Beqaa Valley . It is said to be dedicated to Venus (or possibly also Astarte , before the Roman era in the region). Part of two enclosure walls and the temple foundations remain intact. Many inscriptions, written in Latin were found at the temple site. A few Ancient Greek inscriptions were also found. It
200-640: A Hellenistic trend, the Corinthian order and its variant the Composite order were most common in surviving Roman temples, but for small temples like that at Alcántara , a simple Tuscan order could be used. Vitruvius does not recognise the Composite order in his writings, and covers the Tuscan order only as Etruscan; Renaissance writers formalized them from observing surviving buildings. The front of
300-532: A golden fish in Yammoune lake to escape from the vengeance of Adonis 's wrathful brother Typhon . The lake is filled from a water cavern to the west of the temple has only one outflow, through a big hole and Robert Boulanger suggested that it might dry up entirely at the end of summer. The valley of Ouyoun Ergush leads from Yammoune towards Marjhine . A network of rock-cut irrigation channels and watercourses lead from Lake Yammoune to provide irrigation for
400-472: A cathedral-like position in the official religion of Rome. It was destroyed by fire three times, and rapidly rebuilt in contemporary styles. The first building, traditionally dedicated in 509 BC, has been claimed to have been almost 60 m × 60 m (200 ft × 200 ft), much larger than other Roman temples for centuries after, although its size is heavily disputed by specialists. Whatever its size, its influence on other early Roman temples
500-522: A four-columned Roman triumphal arch and added a pediment above; San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice , begun 1566, by Andrea Palladio , which has two superimposed temple fronts, one low and wide, the other tall and narrow; the Villa Capra "La Rotonda" , 1567 on, also by Palladio, with four isolated temple fronts on each side of a rectangle, with a large central dome. In Baroque architecture two temple fronts, often of different orders, superimposed one above
600-523: A hill, probably had many wide steps at the approach to the main front, followed by a flat area before the final few steps. After the eclipse of the Etruscan models, the Greek classical orders in all their details were closely followed in the façades of Roman temples, as in other prestigious buildings, with the direct adoption of Greek models apparently beginning around 200 BC, under the late Republic. But
700-559: A huge pilgrimage complex of the 1st century BC led visitors up several levels with large buildings on a steep hillside, before they eventually reached the sanctuary itself, a much smaller circular building. A caesareum was a temple devoted to the Imperial cult . Caesarea were located throughout the Roman Empire , and often funded by the imperial government, tending to replace state spending on new temples to other gods, and becoming
800-478: A kind of weapon, the crescent axe . Within Iberian culture, it has been proposed that native sculptures like those of Baza , Elche or Cerro de los Santos might represent an Iberized image of Astarte or Tanit. The earliest record of ʿAṯtart is from Ebla in the 3rd millennium BC, where her name is attested in the forms 𒀾𒁯𒋫 ( Aštarta ) and 𒅖𒁯𒋫 ( Ištarta ). The main cult centre of ʿAṯtart
900-597: A more erotic goddess as opposed to her early Bronze Age worship in Ugarit and Syria, and that early attestations of Aphrodite, were more war-like. Greeks in classical, Hellenistic, and Roman times occasionally equated Aphrodite with Astarte and many other Near Eastern goddesses, in keeping with their frequent practice of syncretizing other deities with their own. In addition, certain aspects of other Greek gods, such as Artemis Astrateia are hypothesized to be heavily influenced by Astarte. Major centers of Astarte's worship in
1000-562: A number of senior posts in the Iranian government. He wrote about the village “Their men are courageous and mostly armed ... They don’t submit to government authority and don’t pay for water and electricity. They have fought several times with neighbouring Christian villages and have won. They like the [Shiite] clergy.” The village lies on the Yammoune Fault line, a geological fault responsible for several historical earthquakes in
1100-463: A panther. This association of ʿAṯtartu with the lion corroborates with significant comparative evidence from ancient West Asia and North Africa: ʿAṯtartu in her form as a lioness might have been invoked as a theophoric element in the personal names 𐎌𐎎𐎍𐎁𐎛 ( Šuma-labʾi , lit. ' Name of the Lioness ' ), and 𐎓𐎁𐎄𐎍𐎁𐎛𐎚 ( ʿAbdi-Labiʾti , lit. ' Servant of
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#17327762560291200-428: A question, or "now womenfolk hunt!" sarcastically, to contrast her with human women, who were not supposed to hunt. Thus, while Baal and Resheph were both hunter gods whose roles as such made them conform to masculine gender roles, the roles of ʿAṯtartu and Anat as hunter and warrior goddesses constituted an inversion with respect to the gender roles of human women. This made them role models and mentors, as Anat does in
1300-524: A scientific and cultural nature reserve since 1998 and is known for distinguishing juniper trees. The area is popular as a hiking trail . Roman temple Ancient Roman temples were among the most important buildings in Roman culture , and some of the richest buildings in Roman architecture , though only a few survive in any sort of complete state. Today they remain "the most obvious symbol of Roman architecture". Their construction and maintenance
1400-448: A shadow like the stars, implying that ʿAṯtartu herself was brilliant and removed a shadow like the stars do, or as herself shining like the stars. This passage leads to another one in which Baal desires ʿAṯtartu for her beauty, and approaches her. ʿAṯtartu also appears as a huntress in the text KTU 1.114 , where she and her sister Anat are consistently described as hunting together and bringing back game whose meat they distributed to
1500-450: A statue of Adonis in the temple, carrying an ear of corn in one hand and a quivver and a lamb in the other. He stored the statue at a museum he founded in the ruins of Baalbek . Alouf also found a Roman road measuring 200 metres (0.12 mi), located 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) southeast of the lake. He also found another square building measuring approximately 12 square metres (130 sq ft) next to this road. The building
1600-645: A steak for him, and Anat a tenderloin ' ). Attestations of ʿAṯtartu as a warrior goddess at Ugarit are minimal, with the principal one being her role in the text KTU 1.2 I 40 , where she and Anat together restrain Baal by holding, respectively, his left and right hands. This text also linked ʿAṯtartu and Anat through poetic parallelism in the lines 𐎊𐎎𐎐𐎅𐎟𐎓𐎐𐎚𐎟𐎚𐎜𐎃𐎄𐎟𐎌𐎎𐎀𐎍𐎅𐎟𐎚𐎜𐎃𐎄𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚 ( ymnh ʿAnatu tʾuḫd šmʾalh tʾuḫd ʿAṯtartu , lit. ' His right hand Anat seized, His left hand ʿAṯtartu seized ' ). The Ugaritic text KTU 1.86 ,
1700-493: Is considered likely to be initially very small and of Phoenician origin, but it was greatly enlarged and improved by the Romans Ernest Renan visited the site and discovered sections of a frieze and parts of pediment attributed to the temple. A partly broken cockle shell with a figure of a goddess with outstretched arms was also found recently during ploughing by a tractor . The ancient name of Yammoune
1800-413: Is like the loveliness of Anat, whose beauty is like the beauty of ʿAṯtartu ' ), in which Anat and ʿAṯtartu were connected through poetic parallels. Another trait which both Anat and ʿAṯtartu shared was their love of war, and their pairing appears to have been due to their common roles as beautiful hunters and warrior goddesses. The Ugaritic ʿAṯtartu nevertheless did not yet possess the erotic traits of
1900-408: Is mentioned immediately after Anat, and the two goddesses' names are combined in the form 𐎓𐎐𐎚𐎟𐎆𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎛𐎐𐎁𐎁𐎅 ( ʿAnatu-wa-ʿAṯtartu ʾInbubaha , lit. ' Anat and ʿAṯtartu at ʾInbubu ' ), and the incantation itself is intended to be delivered to Anat's home at ʾInbubu, thus putting ʿAṯtartu on a secondary level compared to Anat. ʿAṯtartu was also mentioned on the side of
2000-457: Is not known however some have suggested that it was once the location of a Festival of Adonis . The temple is situated on a hill, approximately 300 metres (980 ft) from the main spring in the area, the Naba al-Arbain . It lies next to the lake where it is considered ancient worshippers took pilgrimage from the temple at Afqa to purify themselves in the temple waters. Michael Alouf found
2100-580: Is particularly associated with her worship in the ancient Levant among the Canaanites and Phoenicians , though she was originally associated with Amorite cities like Ugarit and Emar , as well as Mari and Ebla . She was also celebrated in Egypt , especially during the reign of the Ramessides , following the importation of foreign cults there. Phoenicians introduced her cult in their colonies on
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#17327762560292200-726: Is the Tempietto of Donato Bramante in the courtyard of San Pietro in Montorio in Rome, c. 1502, which has been widely admired ever since. Though the Pantheon's large circular domed cella, with a conventional portico front, is "unique" in Roman architecture, it has been copied many times by modern architects. Versions include the church of Santa Maria Assunta in Ariccia by Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1664), which followed his work restoring
2300-649: The Greek pantheon in Mycenaean and Dark Age times to form Aphrodite . An outdated argument, however, postulates that Astarte's character was less erotic and more warlike than Ishtar originally was, perhaps because she was influenced by the Canaanite goddess Anat , and that therefore Ishtar, not Astarte, was the direct forerunner of the Cypriot goddess. However, evidence from Iron Age Phoenicia show that Astarte became
2400-568: The Iberian Peninsula . The Proto-Semitic form of this goddess's name was ʿAṯtart . While earlier scholarship suggested that the name ʿAṯtart was formed by adding the Afroasiatic feminine suffix -t to the name of the deity ʿAṯtar , more recent views accept the names ʿAṯtar and ʿAṯtart as being etymologically related while considering the exact relationship between them to be unclear. The meaning of
2500-653: The Iron Age were the Phoenician city-states of Sidon , Tyre , and Byblos . Coins from Sidon portray a chariot in which a globe appears, presumably a stone representing Astarte. "She was often depicted on Sidonian coins as standing on the prow of a galley, leaning forward with right hand outstretched, being thus the original of all figureheads for sailing ships." In Sidon, she shared a temple with Eshmun . Coins from Beirut show Poseidon , Astarte, and Eshmun worshipped together. Other significant locations where she
2600-725: The Ptolemaic dynasty , the last pharaoh of Ancient Egypt , to honour her dead lover Julius Caesar , then converted by Augustus to his own cult. During the 4th century, after the Empire had come under Christian rule, it was converted to a church. The Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on the Capitoline Hill was the oldest large temple in Rome, a capitolium dedicated to the Capitoline Triad consisting of Jupiter and his companion deities, Juno and Minerva , and had
2700-652: The Roman Forum , originally the Temple of Romulus , was not dedicated as a church until 527. The best known is the Pantheon, Rome , which, however, is highly untypical, being a very large circular temple with a magnificent concrete roof, behind a conventional portico front. The English word "temple" derives from the Latin templum , which was originally not the building itself, but a sacred space surveyed and plotted ritually. The Roman architect Vitruvius always uses
2800-406: The Temple of Hercules Victor in Rome, which was perhaps by a Greek architect, these survivors had an unbroken colonnade encircling the building, and a low, Greek-style podium. Different formulae were followed in the Pantheon, Rome and a small temple at Baalbek (usually called the "Temple of Venus"), where the door is behind a full portico, though very different ways of doing this are used. In
2900-418: The colonnade , or at least down the sides. The description of the Greek models used here is a generalization of classical Greek ideals, and later Hellenistic buildings often do not reflect them. For example, the "Temple of Dionysus" on the terrace by the theatre at Pergamon (Ionic, 2nd century BC, on a hillside), had many steps in front, and no columns beyond the portico. The Parthenon , also approached up
3000-522: The templum ; often on one of the narrow extensions of the podium to the side of the steps. Especially under the Empire , exotic foreign cults gained followers in Rome, and were the local religions in large parts of the expanded Empire. These often had very different practices, some preferring underground places of worship, while others, like Early Christians , worshiped in houses. Some remains of many Roman temples still survive, above all in Rome itself, but
3100-543: The 𐎒𐎔𐎗𐎟𐎈𐎍𐎎𐎎 ( Sipru Ḥulumīma , lit. ' Book of Dreams ' ), mentions the horses of ʿAṯtartu, which might possibly be another allusion to her role as a warrior. Possibly due to her role as a goddess of warfare, ʿAṯtartu was sometimes mentioned alongside the god Resheph in Ugaritic texts, such as in administrative documents, with jars of wine for the temples of ʿAṯtartu and of Resheph- gn being respectively mentioned immediately after each other in
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3200-598: The 80s AD, under Domitian – the third building only lasted five years before burning down again. After a major sacking by Vandals in 455, and comprehensive removal of stone in the Renaissance, only foundations can now be seen, in the basement of the Capitoline Museums . The sculptor Flaminio Vacca (d 1605) claimed that the life-size Medici lion he carved to match a Roman survival, now in Florence ,
3300-759: The Glory of the Great Army"), the Virginia State Capitol as originally built in 1785–88, and Birmingham Town Hall (1832–34). Small Roman circular temples with colonnades have often been used as models, either for single buildings, large or small, or elements such as domes raised on drums, in buildings on another plan such as St Peters, Rome , St Paul's Cathedral in London and the United States Capitol . The great progenitor of these
3400-513: The Greeks, with subsequent heavy direct influence from Greece. Public religious ceremonies of the official Roman religion took place outdoors and not within the temple building. Some ceremonies were processions that started at, visited, or ended with a temple or shrine, where a ritual object might be stored and brought out for use, or where an offering would be deposited. Sacrifices , chiefly of animals , would take place at an open-air altar within
3500-752: The Hurrian goddesses 𒀭𒅖𒄩𒊏 ( ᴰ ʾIšḫara , called 𐎜𐎌𐎃𐎗𐎊 ( ʾUšḫaraya ) in Ugaritic), and 𒀭𒊭𒀀𒍑𒅗𒀀 ( ᴰ Šauška , called 𐎘𐎜𐎘𐎋 ( Ṯaʾuṯka ), and supporters of the interpretation of the name ʿAṯtartu Ḫurri as "ʿAṯtartu of the Hurrians" suggest that this manifestation of ʿAṯtartu was the one identified with the Hurrian goddess Šauška . Other possible manifestations of ʿAṯtartu at Ugarit might have included 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎐𐎄𐎗𐎂 ( ʿAṯtartu ndrg ) and 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎀𐎁𐎏𐎗 ( ʿAṯtartu ʾabḏr ), of still uncertain meaning, with
3600-453: The Lioness ' ), the latter of which holds the same meaning as the personal names 𒁹𒀴𒀀𒅆𒅕𒋾 ( ʿAbdi-ʿAširti ) and 𒁹𒀴𒀭𒈹 ( ʿAbdi-ʿAštarti ), both meaning "Servant of ʿAṯtartu." Although divine roles were often modelled on human ones, such as masculine gods in relation to patriarchy and kingship being represented like human men, and feminine goddesses in relation to marriage and domestic chores being represented like human women,
3700-595: The Northwest Semitic goddess was present a trait which was also characteristic of the South Arabian masculine hypostasis of ʿAṯtar, in whose honour sacred hunts were performed as fertility rite. This hunter aspect of ʿAṯtartu later faded away by the 1st millennium BC. In the later portion of the text KTU 1.92 , ʿAṯtartu was given clothing, after which she is described as 𐎐𐎌𐎀𐎚𐎟𐎑𐎍𐎟𐎋𐎟𐎋𐎁𐎋𐎁𐎎 ( nšʾat ẓl k kbkbm ), meaning either raising
3800-409: The Pantheon only the portico has columns, and the "thoroughly uncomfortable" exterior meeting of the portico and circular cella are often criticised. At Baalbek, a wide portico with a broken pediment is matched by four other columns round the building, with the architrave in scooped curving sections, each ending in a projection supported by a column. At Praeneste (modern Palestrina) near Rome,
3900-627: The Roman original, Belle Isle House (1774) in England, and Thomas Jefferson 's library at the University of Virginia , The Rotunda (1817–26). The Pantheon was much the largest and most accessible complete classical temple front known to the Italian Renaissance, and was the standard exemplar when these were revived. Most of the best survivals had been converted to churches (and sometimes later mosques), which some remain. Often
4000-468: The Roman temple front. An archetypical pattern for churches in Georgian architecture was set by St Martin-in-the-Fields in London (1720), by James Gibbs , who boldly added to the classical temple façade at the west end a large steeple on top of a tower, set back slightly from the main frontage. This formula shocked purists and foreigners, but became accepted and was very widely copied, at home and in
4100-539: The area. A new section of the fault was discovered in 2010 by Ata Elias of the American University of Beirut . They studied samples from a trench in Marjahine that will allow them to improve dating on historical earthquakes and better predict future ones. Lake Yammoune is home to Lebanon's only endemic fish , Pseudophoxinus libani . In Phoenician Mythology , the goddess Astarte turned herself into
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4200-513: The brides of Baal, and later sources, such as the role of the Phoenician ʿAštart as the consort of Baal, also suggest that ʿAṯtartu was a consort of Baal, although this evidence is still very uncertain and this pairing appears to have been distinctly Levantine. Another connection between ʿAṯtartu and Baal was through her name 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎌𐎎𐎟𐎁𐎓𐎍 ( ʿAṯtartu šuma Baʿli , lit. ' ʿAṯtartu-Name-of-Baal ' ). This name defined
4300-612: The building of new imperial temples mostly ceased after the reign of Marcus Aurelius (d. 180), though the Temple of Romulus on the Roman Forum was built and dedicated by the Emperor Maxentius to his son Valerius Romulus , who died in childhood in 309 and was deified. One of the earliest and most prominent of the caesarea was the Caesareum of Alexandria , located on the harbour. It was begun by Cleopatra VII of
4400-706: The cella, and most public ceremonies were performed outside of the cella where the sacrificial altar was located, on the portico , with a crowd gathered in the temple precinct. The most common architectural plan had a rectangular temple raised on a high podium , with a clear front with a portico at the top of steps, and a triangular pediment above columns. The sides and rear of the building had much less architectural emphasis, and typically no entrances. There were also circular plans, generally with columns all round, and outside Italy there were many compromises with traditional local styles. The Roman form of temple developed initially from Etruscan temples , themselves influenced by
4500-556: The colonies, for example at St Andrew's Church, Chennai in India and St. Paul's Chapel in New York City (1766). Examples of modern buildings that stick more faithfully to the ancient rectangular temple form are only found from the 18th century onwards. Versions of the Roman temple as a discrete block include La Madeleine, Paris (1807), now a church but built by Napoleon as a Temple de la Gloire de la Grande Armée ("Temple to
4600-439: The consorts of Baal might constitute indirect evidence that this might also have been the case at Ugarit. Sacrifice to ʿAṯtartu might have been included in the list of sacrifices for the family of Baal in the Ugaritic text KTU 1.148.16 possibly because ʿAṯtartu might have been regarded as the consort of Baal at Ugarit. Contemporary sources, including Egyptian adaptations of West Semitic myths which feature ʿAṯtartu and Anat as
4700-609: The counterpart of Assyro-Babylonian goddess Ištar , and of the Hurrian Ishtar-like goddesses Ishara (presumably in her aspect of "lady of love") and Shaushka ; in some cities, the western forms of the name and the eastern form "Ishtar" were fully interchangeable. In later times Astarte was worshipped in Syria and Canaan . Her worship spread to Cyprus , where she may have been merged with an ancient Cypriot goddess. This merged Cypriot goddess may have been adopted into
4800-623: The distinctive classical features, and may have had considerable continuity with pre-Roman temples of the Celtic religion . Romano-Celtic temples were often circular, and circular temples of various kinds were built by the Romans. Greek models were available in tholos shrines and some other buildings , as assembly halls and various other functions. Temples of the goddess Vesta , which were usually small, typically had this shape, as in those at Rome and Tivoli (see list), which survive in part. Like
4900-547: The distinctive differences in the general arrangement of temples between the Etruscan-Roman style and the Greek, as outlined above, were retained. However the idealized proportions between the different elements in the orders set out by the only significant Roman writer on architecture to survive, Vitruvius , and subsequent Italian Renaissance writers, do not reflect actual Roman practice, which could be very variable, though always aiming at balance and harmony. Following
5000-410: The exceptional roles of ʿAṯtartu and ʿAnatu as hunter and warrior goddesses signalled them as being at odds with the social norms of the societies where human women were not supposed to hunt of which they were deities. This characterisation is made explicit in the myth of Aqhat, where Aqhat exclaims to Anat, 𐎅𐎚𐎟𐎚𐎕𐎄𐎐𐎟𐎚𐎛𐎐𐎘𐎚 ( ht tṣdn tʾinṯt ), meaning either "now do womenfolk hunt?" as
5100-474: The existence of a manifestation of ʿAṯtart who resided in Mari. At Ugarit , the local variant of ʿAṯtart, 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚 ( ʿAṯtartu ), was devoid of any astral aspects or associations with ʿAṯtar, and she played a minor role in mythological texts, but was often mentioned in Ugaritic ritual and administrative texts, thus suggesting that she was important for the institution of the royalty. ʿAṯtartu at Ugarit
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#17327762560295200-426: The extensive painted statuary that decorated the rooflines, and the elaborate revetments and antefixes , in colourful terracotta in earlier examples, that enlivened the entablature . Etruscan and Roman temples emphasised the front of the building, which followed Greek temple models and typically consisted of wide steps leading to a portico with columns, a pronaos , and usually a triangular pediment above, which
5300-464: The gods. In this text, ʿAṯtartu is mentioned before Anat, unlike most Ugaritic texts where this order is inverted, although the two goddesses are again connected through poetic parallels in the lines 10 to 11, reading 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎆𐎓𐎐𐎚𐎟𐎊𐎎𐎙𐎊𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎚𐎓𐎄𐎁𐎟𐎐𐎌𐎁𐎟𐎍𐎅𐎟𐎆𐎓𐎐𐎚𐎟𐎋𐎚𐎔 ( ʿAṯtarta wa-ʿAnata yamġiyu ʿAṯtartu taʿdubu našabi lêhu wa-ʿAnatu katipa , lit. ' ʿAṯtartu and Anat he approached; ʿAṯtartu had prepared
5400-667: The identity of the goddess as being in relation to Baal. ʿAṯtartu's role as the Name-of-Baal might also have been connected to the use of Baal's name as a magical weapon, such as in the text KTU 1.2 IV 28 , where one line reads 𐎁𐎌𐎎𐎟𐎚𐎂𐎓𐎗𐎎𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚 ( bi-šumi tigʿaruma ʿAṯtartu , lit. ' By Name, ʿAṯtartu hexed (Yam) ' ), in reference to ʿAṯtartu invoking the power of Baal's name and his titles, such as 𐎀𐎍𐎛𐎊𐎐𐎟𐎁𐎓𐎍 ( ʾalʾiyanu Baʿlu , lit. ' Mighty Baal ' ) and 𐎗𐎋𐎁𐎟𐎓𐎗𐎔𐎚 ( rākibu ʿurpati , lit. ' Rider of
5500-461: The large pieces of massive columns were less easy to remove and make use of; hence the podium, minus facing, and some columns are often all that remain. In most cases loose pieces of stone have been removed from the site, and some such as capitals may be found in local museums, along with non-architectural items excavated, such as terracotta votive statuettes or amulets, which are often found in large numbers. Very little indeed survives in place from
5600-443: The late Republic there was a switch to using Greek classical and Hellenistic styles, without much change in the key features of the form. The Etruscans were a people of northern Italy, whose civilization was at its peak in the seventh century BC. The Etruscans were already influenced by early Greek architecture , so Roman temples were distinctive but with both Etruscan and Greek features. Surviving temples (both Greek and Roman) lack
5700-423: The later Canaanite ʿAštart. In the text KTU 1.92 , ʿAṯtartu is called 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎕𐎆𐎄𐎚 ( ʿAṯtartu Ṣawwādatu , lit. ' ʿAṯtartu the huntress ' ) in the lines 2-3, with the next line mentioning her as 𐎚𐎍𐎋𐎟𐎁𐎎𐎄𐎁𐎗 ( taliku bi-madbari , lit. ' going to the desert ' ). The following lines recorded that the goddess saw something whose name is lost due to damage to
5800-467: The latter being affixed with the title 𐎖𐎄𐎌𐎚 ( Qadišatu , lit. ' the Holy One ' ). In in the hymn RIH 98/02 , ʿAṯtartu is called on to "shut the jaw of El's attackers" in the line 𐎚𐎕𐎔𐎖𐎟𐎍𐎈𐎚𐎟𐎄𐎟𐎂𐎗𐎟𐎛𐎍 ( taṣpiq laḥata dā gūri ʾIli , lit. ' May she shut the jaw of El's attackers ' ), which finds a literary parallel in the myth of Aqhat , where
5900-437: The lion, she's associated to the dove and the bee . She has also been associated with botanic wildlife like the palm tree and the lotus flower . A particular artistic motif assimilates Astarte to Europa , portraying her as riding a bull that would represent a partner deity. Similarly, after the popularization of her worship in Egypt , it was frequent to associate her with the war chariot of Ra or Horus , as well as
6000-530: The main entrance of grand buildings, but often flanked by large wings or set in courtyards. This flexibility has allowed the Roman temple front to be used in buildings made for a wide variety of purposes. The colonnade may no longer be pushed forward with a pronaus porch, and it may not be raised above the ground, but the essential shape remains the same. Among thousands of examples are the White House , Buckingham Palace , and St Peters, Rome ; in recent years
6100-416: The main or only large temple in new Roman towns in the provinces. This was the case at Évora , Vienne and Nîmes , which were all expanded by the Romans as coloniae from Celtic oppida soon after their conquest. Imperial temples paid for by the government usually used conventional Roman styles all over the empire, regardless of the local styles seen in smaller temples. In newly planned Roman cities
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#17327762560296200-729: The manifestations of ʿAṯtartu attested in the Late Bronze Age was 𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎃𐎗 ( ʿAṯtartu Ḫurri ), whose name has been variously interpreted as ʿAṯtartu of the Hurrians, ʿAṯtartu of the Grotto or Cavern, ʿAṯtartu of the Tomb(s), or ʿAṯtartu of the Window, and was also recorded at Ugarit in Akkadian as 𒀭𒌋𒁯 𒄯𒊑 ( ᴰ ʿAṯtartu Ḫurri ), and as 𒀭𒌋𒁯 𒄷𒊑 ( ᴰ Ištar Ḫurri ). Some Ugaritic texts identified ʿAṯtartu with
6300-409: The name of the lioness. O name, may you be victorious... May you shut the jaws of El's attackers. A mighty panther is ʿAṯtartu, A mighty panther that pounces. The hymn especially emphasizes ʿAṯtartu and her name, with its mention of the goddess as "name" possibly being connected to her role as the Name-of-Baal, and the second line calls her a "lioness" while the fourth and fifth lines liken her to
6400-512: The names ʿAṯtar and ʿAṯtart are themselves still unclear. The Masoretic Text vocalization ʿAštōret is in dispute: most scholars consider it as an artificial superimposition of the vowels of the Hebrew word bōšet ("shame") upon the consonants of the original name; some other suggest it is a result of the Canaanite shift from /ā/ to /ō/ (despite the unexpected occurrence of
6500-408: The narrative as applying the components of the cure to cause the healing, thus connecting the two goddesses with healing. Among the Ugaritic incantations mentioning ʿAṯtartu are two where she is invoked to protect against snakebites: in the first incantation, from the text KTU 1.100 , which is part of a sequence addressed to the sun-goddess Shapash to be delivered to a succession of deities, she
6600-486: The offerings floated, then they had been rejected and gave a bad omen to Palmyra and the surrounding lands. Eusebius records that the Emperor Constantine destroyed a temple of Venus 'on the summit of Mount Lebanon.' and probably it was this pagan temple dedicated to Venus. During the 1970s Ali Akbar Mohtashamipur lived in Yammoune whilst receiving military training at a Fatah camp. He later held
6700-505: The other, became extremely common for Catholic churches, often with the uppermost one supported by huge volutes to each side. This can be seen developing in the Gesù, Rome (1584), Santa Susanna , Rome (1597), Santi Vincenzo e Anastasio a Trevi (1646) and Val-de-Grâce , Paris (1645 on). The Palladian villas of the Veneto include numerous ingenious and influential variations on the theme of
6800-634: The population expected in its sacred architecture . This was especially the case in Egypt and the Near East , where different traditions of large stone temples were already millennia old. The Romano-Celtic temple was a simple style, usually with little use of stone, for small temples found in the Western Empire , and by far the most common type in Roman Britain , where they were usually square, with an ambulatory . It often lacked any of
6900-724: The porticos were walled in between the columns, and the original cella front and side walls largely removed to create a large single space in the interior. Rural areas in the Islamic world have some good remains, which had been left largely undisturbed. In Spain some remarkable discoveries (Vic, Cordoba, Barcelona) were made in the 19th century when old buildings being reconstructed or demolished were found to contain major remains encased in later buildings. In Rome, Pula, and elsewhere some walls incorporated in later buildings have always been evident. The squared-off blocks of temple walls have always been attractive for later builders to reuse, while
7000-561: The region of the Beqaa Valley around Baalbek. Marvin H. Pope (Yale University) identified the home of El in the Ugaritic texts of ca. 1200 BCE, described as "at the source[s] of the [two] rivers, in the midst of the fountains of the [two] deeps", with this famous lake and Afqa , source of the river Adonis on the other side of the mountain, which Pope asserted was closely associated with it in legend. The area has been classed as
7100-490: The relatively few near-complete examples were nearly all converted into Christian churches (and sometimes subsequently to mosques ), usually a considerable time after the initial triumph of Christianity under Constantine . The decline of Roman religion was relatively slow, and the temples themselves were not appropriated by the government until a decree of the Emperor Honorius in 415. Santi Cosma e Damiano , in
7200-606: The sea ' ), suggesting that this incantation alluded to three distinct water bodies. ʿAṯtartu's emblem was the lion, and she was explicitly called a lioness and a panther in the hymn RIH 98/02 , which reads: 𐎌𐎎𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎖𐎍𐎟𐎊𐎌𐎗𐎟 𐎛𐎏𐎎𐎗𐎟𐎍𐎁𐎛𐎟𐎌𐎎𐎟𐎍𐎁𐎛𐎟𐎌𐎎𐎟𐎚𐎋𐎌𐎄𐎟𐎍 𐎚𐎕𐎔𐎖𐎟𐎍𐎈𐎚𐎟𐎄𐎟𐎂𐎗𐎟𐎛𐎍 𐎐𐎎𐎗𐎟𐎈𐎘𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚 𐎐𐎎𐎗𐎟𐎈𐎘𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎚𐎗𐎖𐎕 šuma ʿAṯtarti qāla yašir ʾiḏmara šuma labʾi šuma takaššidu lê taṣpiq laḥata dā gūri ʾIli namiru ḥaṯiratu ʿAṯtartu namiru ḥaṯiratu tarquṣu The name of ʿAṯtartu may my voice sing, May I praise
7300-522: The shift in this position), or, with an assumption of an early form * ʿAštārit , as a conventional occurrence of the shift -ā(r)i- to -ō(r)ē- . In various cultures Astarte was connected with some combination of the following spheres: war , sexuality , royal power, beauty, healing and - especially in Ugarit and Emar - hunting; however, known sources do not indicate she was a fertility goddess , contrary to opinions in early scholarship. Her symbol
7400-738: The significant quantities of large sculpture that originally decorated temples. Astarte Astarte ( / ə ˈ s t ɑːr t iː / ; Ἀστάρτη , Astartē ) is the Hellenized form of the Ancient Near Eastern goddess ʿAṯtart . ʿAṯtart was the Northwest Semitic equivalent of the East Semitic goddess Ishtar . Astarte was worshipped from the Bronze Age through classical antiquity , and her name
7500-410: The specific association with religion that it had for the Romans. Generally, later adaptions lack the colour of the original, and though there may be sculpture filling the pediment in grand examples, the full Roman complement of sculpture above the roofline is rarely emulated. Variations on the theme, mostly Italian in origin, include: San Andrea, Mantua , 1462 by Leon Battista Alberti , which took
7600-497: The story of Aqhat, in which she addresses him with the intimate term "my brother" and tells him that she will instruct him in hunting, thus being able to bond with the addressee and be present and active in him development into an accomplished hunter. The episode of ʿAṯtartu performing filial duties by "shutting down the jaws" of the enemies of El was another case of gender inversion where the goddess successfully performed actions which among mortals were reserved for men only. One of
7700-440: The tablet on which the inscription was written. In this incantation, the first instance of ʿAṯtartu was that of ʿAṯtartu of Ugarit, while the second one was ʿAṯtartu of Mari. In a second incantation against snakebites, from the text KTU 1.107 , ʿAṯtartu was mentioned after Anat in a pairing of the two goddesses as part of a list also including pairings of Baal and Dagon , and Resheph and Yarikh . A third incantation, from
7800-531: The temple front has become fashionable in China. Renaissance and later architects worked out ways of harmoniously adding high raised domes, towers and spires above a colonnaded temple portico front, something the Romans would have found odd. The Roman temple front remains a familiar feature of subsequent Early Modern architecture in the Western tradition, but although very commonly used for churches, it has lost
7900-476: The temple typically carried an inscription saying who had built it, cut into the stone with a "V" section. This was filled with brightly coloured paint, usually scarlet or vermilion . In major imperial monuments the letters were cast in lead and held in by pegs, then also painted or gilded . These have usually long vanished, but archaeologists can generally reconstruct them from the peg-holes, and some have been re-created and set in place. Sculptural decoration
8000-487: The temple was normally centrally placed at one end of the forum, often facing the basilica at the other. In the city of Rome, a caesareum was located within the religious precinct of the Arval Brothers . In 1570, it was documented as still containing nine statues of Roman emperors in architectural niches. Most of the earlier emperors had their own very large temples in Rome, but a faltering economy meant that
8100-530: The temple, which could be viewed and approached from all directions, the side and rear walls of Roman temples might be largely undecorated (as in the Pantheon, Rome and Vic ), inaccessible by steps (as in the Maison Carrée and Vic), and even back on to other buildings. As in the Maison Carrée, columns at the side might be half columns , emerging from ("engaged with" in architectural terminology)
8200-448: The text KTU 1.114 did refer to Baal as sexually desiring ʿAṯtartu, with possible mention of a bed in line 32 of the text perhaps alluding to these two deities engaging in sexual intercourse. Although the once widespread view that Anat was also a consort of Baal has recently fallen out of favour due to lack of evidence from Ugarit, indirect evidence, such as Egyptian adaptations of West Semitic myths in which both ʿAṯtartu and Anat were
8300-504: The text KTU 4.219 , and in the text KTU 1.91 's mentioning that the Rašpūma ( lit. ' plural Rašpu s ' ). Moreover, the attribute animal of Resheph was the lion, which was analogous to the lioness being the symbol of the warrior goddess ʿAṯtartu. In the text KTU 1.114 , ʿAṯtartu and Anat also went to hunt for ingredients to cure the drunkenness of El, to whose household they belonged, and they are later mentioned in
8400-484: The text KTU 92.2016 , either against fever or for good childbirth, mentioned 𐎁𐎓𐎍𐎟𐎖𐎄𐎌𐎎𐎟𐎁𐎐𐎅𐎗 ( Baʿli qadišūma bi-nahri , lit. ' Baal and the holy ones in the river ' ), followed by 𐎐𐎃𐎍𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎁𐎟𐎗𐎈𐎁𐎐 ( naḫla ʿAṯtarti bi-Raḥbāni , lit. ' the torrent of ʿAṯtartu, in the Raḥbānu ' ), itself in turn followed by 𐎁𐎊𐎎 ( bi-Yammi , lit. ' in
8500-436: The text, and line 5 mentions that the deeps surge with water, which might either refer to a celestial sign or to a possible damp terrain where ʿAṯtartu was hunting. The lines 6-13 described ʿAṯtartu taking cover in the low ground and holding her weapons while hunting, and she finally slew an animal whose name is lost in line 14. Following this, ʿAṯtartu fed the animal she had slain to the gods El and Yarikh . Thus, present in
8600-405: The titular hero Aqhat is instructed to 𐎉𐎁𐎖𐎟𐎍𐎈𐎚𐎟𐎐𐎛𐎕𐎅 ( ṭābiqu laḥatê nāʾiṣihu , lit. ' shut the jaw of his (father's) detractors ' ), thus signaling ʿAṯtartu as performing filial duties by protecting El, the patriarch of whose household she was a member of. Although there is little to no evidence of ʿAṯtartu being explicitly considered the consort of Baal at Ugarit,
8700-453: The wall. The platform on which the temple sat was typically raised higher in Etruscan and Roman examples than Greek, with up to ten, twelve or more steps rather than the three typical in Greek temples; the Temple of Claudius was raised twenty steps. These steps were normally only at the front, and typically not the whole width of that. It might or might not be possible to walk around the temple exterior inside ( Temple of Hadrian ) or outside
8800-585: The word templum to refer to the sacred precinct, and not to the building. The more common Latin words for a temple or shrine were sacellum (a small shrine or chapel), aedes , delubrum , and fanum (in this article, the English word "temple" refers to any of these buildings, and the Latin templum to the sacred precinct). The form of the Roman temple was mainly derived from the Etruscan model, but in
8900-547: Was Mari , where early texts from her temple pre-dating the city's destruction by the Akkadian Empire record her name as 𒀭𒀸𒁯𒊏𒀜 ( ᴰ ʿAṯtarat ), who appears to have been distinguished from ʿAṯtart's East Semitic equivalent, the Mesopotamian goddess Ištar , at Mari. One text from Mari records that offerings were made to both ʿAṯtarat and the river-god Nārum together. The main cult centre of ʿAṯtart
9000-471: Was a major part of ancient Roman religion , and all towns of any importance had at least one main temple, as well as smaller shrines. The main room ( cella ) housed the cult image of the deity to whom the temple was dedicated , and often a table for supplementary offerings or libations and a small altar for incense. Behind the cella was a room, or rooms, used by temple attendants for storage of equipment and offerings. The ordinary worshiper rarely entered
9100-522: Was associated with the goddess Anat , with Anat usually preceding ʿAṯtartu, and the two goddesses were often connected to each other through poetic parallelism. Both goddesses shared common traits such as perfect beauty, which characterised young goddesses, with the human Ḥuraya being compared to them in the text KTU 1.13 III using the terms 𐎄𐎋𐎟𐎐𐎓𐎎𐎟𐎓𐎐𐎚𐎟𐎐𐎓𐎎𐎅𐎟𐎋𐎎𐎟𐎚𐎒𐎎𐎟𐎓𐎘𐎚𐎗𐎚𐎟𐎚𐎒𐎎𐎅 ( dāka nuʿmi ʿAnati nuʿmuha kama têsimi ʿAṯtarti têsimuha . lit. ' whose loveliness
9200-430: Was constructed of large stones and an Ancient Greek inscription was found inside. He considered it an ancient guardhouse or watchtower for protection of travellers. He suggested that oracles were consulted at the temple in connection with Queen Zenobia , who legend tells, sent offerings to the goddess by placing them on the lake. If the offerings sunk to the floor of the lake, then the goddess had accepted them. If
9300-421: Was filled with statuary in the most grand examples; this was as often in terracotta as stone, and no examples have survived except as fragments. Especially in the earlier periods, further statuary might be placed on the roof, and the entablature decorated with antefixes and other elements, all of this being brightly painted. However, unlike the Greek models, which generally gave equal treatment to all sides of
9400-636: Was introduced by Phoenician sailors and colonists were Cythera , Malta , and Eryx in Sicily from which she became known to the Romans as Venus Erycina . Three inscriptions from the Pyrgi Tablets dating to about 500 BC found near Caere in Etruria mentions the construction of a shrine to Astarte in the temple of the local goddess Uni -Astre ( 𐌔𐌄𐌓𐌕𐌔𐌀𐌋𐌀𐌉𐌍𐌖 ). At Carthage Astarte
9500-487: Was made from a single capital from the temple. The Etruscan-Roman adaptation of the Greek temple model to place the main emphasis on the front façade and let the other sides of the building harmonize with it only as much as circumstances and budget allow has generally been adopted in Neoclassical architecture , and other classically derived styles. In these temple fronts with columns and a pediment are very common for
9600-497: Was significant and long-lasting. The same may have been true for the later rebuildings, though here the influence is harder to trace. For the first temple Etruscan specialists were brought in for various aspects of the building, including making and painting the extensive terracotta elements of the entablature or upper parts, such as antefixes . But for the second building they were summoned from Greece. Rebuildings after destruction by fire were completed in 69 BC, 75 AD, and in
9700-467: Was similar to that of Greek temples, often with pedimental sculpture with figures, of which only few fragments survive. However, exterior friezes with figures in relief were much less common. Many acroteria , antefixes and other elements were brightly coloured. In the early Empire older Greek statues were apparently sometimes re-used as acroteria. There was considerable local variation in style, as Roman architects often tried to incorporate elements
9800-532: Was still the city of Mari during the Amorite period, when her name is attested as a theophoric element in personal names such as 𒀭𒀸𒁯𒋫𒍣 ( ᴰ Aštart-azi , lit. ' ʿAṯtart is my strength ' ). However, her name was otherwise written in cuneiform using ideograms and without the feminine suffix -t , in the forms 𒀭𒀸𒁯 ( ᴰ AŠ-DAR ) and 𒀭𒈹 ( ᴰ INANNA ). A contemporary incantation against snakebites from Ugarit recorded
9900-618: Was the lion and she was also often associated with the horse and by extension chariots. The dove might be a symbol of her as well, as evidenced by some Bronze Age cylinder seals. The only images identified with absolute certainty as Astarte are these depicting her as a combatant on horseback or in a chariot. While many authors in the past asserted that she has been known as the deified morning and/or evening star , it has been called into question if she had an astral character at all, at least in Ugarit and Emar. God lists known from Ugarit and other prominent Bronze Age Syrian cities regarded her as
10000-490: Was worshipped alongside the goddess Tanit , and frequently appeared as a theophoric element in personal names. Iconographic portrayal of Astarte, very similar to that of Tanit , often depicts her naked and in presence of lions , identified respectively with symbols of sexuality and war. She is also depicted as winged, carrying the solar disk and the crescent moon as a headdress, and with her lions either lying prostrate to her feet or directly under those. Aside from
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